With a wealth of healthy eating programmes on the television and '5-a-day' fast becoming the nation's new mantra, it is hard to avoid information about healthy eating.

Recently released research reveals that despite our growing knowledge and good intentions, three quarters of us are still struggling to meet the daily target of 5 portions of fruit and vegetables recommended by health experts.

Dietician and health writer Fiona Hunter joins us in the studio to share her quick and easy tips on how to lead a healthier lifestyle amidst the pressures of modern living and tell us why 5-a-day is of long term importance to our health and vitality.

 

Presenter: Janice Vee (JV)
Guest: Fiona Hunter (FH)

JV: Hi everyone and welcome to today's live web chat. I'm Janice and this afternoon we're talking about health, our health. Now I know it's an important issue and I know that you guys all want to be involved. Now apparently three quarters of us aren't eating five portions of fruit and veg every day. Now is it really that difficult for us to swap our crisps for some carrots? Well apparently it is, so in the studio with me now I have nutritional expert Fiona Hunter and she is going to be giving us some tips on healthy eating. Hi Fiona how are you doing?

FH: Hi Janice

JV: So first of all Jenny wants to know why is five the magic number?

FH: Five portions of fruit and/or vegetables a day, and five is the magic number because a lot of the research has been done on people who eat over 400gms and five portions works out at about 400gms of vegetables, and what the research tells us is that people who eat 400gms or more a day are less likely to suffer from heart disease, less likely to suffer from certain types of cancer, less likely to suffer from problems like cataracts. That's why five's the magic number, its 400gms broken down into sort of five 80gm portions.

JV: Ok Jenny I hope that answers your question. Now Melanie needs to know today "what counts towards five a day. I mean you know is it only fruit or vegetables or both?" You know I mean some people don't actually know.

FH: Its both. Its five portions of fruit and/or vegetables, but other things, all of these things that you see here would count, so fresh fruit and vegetables, things like canned, canned sweet corn, canned fruit will count

JV: Really canned?

FH: Yes, frozen vegetables which are incredibly convenient and easy for people to use, but also things like fruit juice. People don't realise that a glass of fruit juice like the Minute Maid Fruit Juice here for instance would count as one of your five servings

JV: Oh ok, so I mean yeah that's interesting to know cos not a lot of people would know that in the morning that's it you know, you've had one portion already and then four to go

FH: One of the easy ways to tick off one of your five portions first thing in the morning is to have a glass of fruit juice with your breakfast cereal, so you're getting the benefit of one of your portions of fruit, but also we know that the Vitamin C in fruit juice, particularly orange juice, helps the absorption of iron from breakfast cereals. So if you have a breakfast cereal, have a glass of fruit juice with it and then you get a double whammy really. You get the fruit and you get the enhanced absorption of the iron.

JV: Ok great. Now Will from Bristol wants to know, now we talk about portions but "Exactly how much is a portion and does it vary from person to person?"

FH: Yes, well you're not alone Will, lots of people stumble with this. If you clench your fist like this, this is what a portion looks like, so it's an apple, an orange. It's a bunch of grapes that look sort of roughly like this.

JV: Ok if you just want to hold it up to the camera so we can see. That's your portion

FH: It's about two to three tablespoons of cooked vegetables like peas or cooked carrots for instance, and the beauty of this fist trick is that you know, its important of course for us all to eat fruit and vegetables, particularly important for children because we know that any good eating habits that they learn while they're little are going to stick with them throughout their life, but of course they have smaller fists so they need smaller portions.

JV: And isn't the fist the size of your stomach supposedly as well?

FH: Well I have heard that Janice. I don't know whether that's true. I can't confirm that.

JV: Ok

FH: But I know it is a portion size, and when we're talking about fruit juice for instance, a glass 150ml, 200ml, so about this much fruit juice will count as one of your servings.

JV: Ok, so that's not that much. I mean what about water as well? I mean you know people say that we have to have with our fruit, and to drink some water as well for the absorption.

FH: We're talking about fruit and vegetables today but one of the other healthy eating messages that as a nutritionist I'm always saying to people is that we need to drink more. Most of us don't drink enough. We're chronically dehydrated and even a mild dehydration can affect your ability to think, to concentrate. It can make you slightly crabby, slightly short tempered, so drink lots. Water is a good thing to drink but lots of people don't like the taste of their water to be honest

JV: Yeah, it doesn't sound that exciting

FH: They prefer to drink something else, something a bit more exciting

JV: And it's easier as well. It's easier to get kids to drink fruit juice as well. Now Pete in Glasgow wants to know does it matter if he eats the same fruit and veg every day. I mean I suppose it's a bit boring but does it really make a difference?

FH: Well variety is the spice of life. It's also the key to a healthy, balanced diet and particularly important when we come to fruit and vegetables. So you said in your introduction, you talked about the five a day message and lots of people will have heard that message. What they may not of heard is that we need to eat five different fruit and vegetables a day and once nice way of helping people remember this is if you think about the colours of the rainbow, and try and eat some fruit or veg from each of those colour bands every day, so some red, some yellow, some green, some oranges, some purples

JV: Well the reds and the greens sound exciting because it's always berries and oranges and such

FH: Yeah

JV: But the greens are always the ones especially for kids. I mean trying to get kids to eat greens is really difficult as well. So you know, I mean does it help to kind of disguise?

FH: Well I know that you've got a couple of little ones haven't you and you're saying your youngest isn't very keen.

JV: It's very hard actually. I have to say you know the idea of broccoli, crisps, broccoli, crisps. I know. It's like hide the crisps

FH: Hide the crisps. The thing is to start them early so the moment you wean babies then introduce some fruits and some vegetables into their diet. You're right, kids are, you know vegetables are not usually top of their list of yummy foods, but mums should continue, and dads, to put vegetables on their plate. You know don't worry too much about how much they eat. Even if they've just eaten a forkful or a teaspoonful that's better than not putting them there

JV: Persevere

FH: Persevere, yes

JV: Johnny Smith in Bow, needs to know, he keeps meaning to stick to five a day, but he never seems to get the opportunity to visit the supermarket to buy fresh produce. So do frozen goods still count?

FH: Yes, it's not just fresh. Frozen and canned and things like dried, so for instance two tablespoons of dried raisins is one portion, three dried apricots, those ready to eat dried apricots is one portion. So what Johnny should do is you know those, have you seen those little bags of dried apricots and dried fruits?

JV: Yes

FH: Pop some of those in your back pack, or in your desk at work, or in the glove compartment of your car then you've got them there when you feel a bit peckish

JV: And seeds as well I've heard apparently, pumpkin seeds, sunflower seeds

FH: And seeds they're good and also things like the fruit juices will count as one portion, and we talked earlier about the importance of staying hydrated. I mean these drinks here are a blend of water and pure fruit juice, so again you get a double whammy there. You get one serving of fruit in a bottle like this, but also you get some water as well which will help you stay hydrated.

JV: So can you be drinking maybe five bottles of juice a day?

FH: Aahh, no. Sadly however much juice you drink, you know even if you drank a litre of the stuff it would only count as one of your five servings, and the reason is that we want to encourage people to eat a variety. You know we spoke earlier about variety being important and the reason it's important is because different fruits and vegetables have different nutrients in, different vitamins, different minerals and different vito-chemicals. So tomatoes for instance have lycopene in, carrots have beta-carotene and the best way to make sure that we get all of this good stuff is to eat a variety. The bigger the variety the more chance we have of getting everything we need.

JV: Scott in Cardiff also wanted to know that question as well because he kind of, he wanted to cheat as well

FH: Yeah, well one top tip you know for people who are watching is to be a little bit more adventurous with fruit and vegetables and we all struggle to reach this target of five a day and I think that's sometimes cos we're not as creative as we could be with fruit and veg. So, rather than just having on the side with your meat and your potatoes try and incorporate vegetables into meals for instance. So, if you're having a curry tonight you know chicken curry, put some frozen spinach in, or if you're having spaghetti bolognaise carrots or sweet corn or something like that

JV: Well in the studio we've got nutrition expert Fiona Hunter so keep your questions coming in because we're doing a live, inter-active web chat with you today. Bill from Twickenham wants to ask you "are there any fruits or vegetables that are so good for you that they count as extra portions?"

FH: Well someone else wanting to cheat.

JV: Why is that? Why do people want to cheat when it comes to eating fruit and veg?

FH: There are some super stars. Yes things like broccoli is particularly healthy, the citrus fruits, but at the end of the day the message is variety and you can't just eat five portions of broccoli. You know you need to have some broccoli and some carrots, and some you know some berries and you know maybe some courgettes, so variety.

JV: Never mind Bill. I mean I was told that blueberries are really good and you can have a whole session of blueberries every morning just to kind of kick start your metabolism

FH: Yeah and if we think about going back to thinking about our rainbow and eating from colours of the rainbow, blueberries are a good one cos there aren't many blue or you know violet foods. Blueberries are very healthy, but the message is not just blueberries. Strawberries, raspberries, oranges, passion fruit, we've got such a huge choice available now but we need to be a little bit more adventurous. Get out of the comfort zone look in some recipe books for some new ideas you know new ways of cooking

JV: Yeah that's a good idea actually recipe books cos we always tend to stick to the same thing you know and cook the same thing as well

FH: I think that's a good point you made. People often get caught in a food rut you know they buy the same things week in week out. You know they trundle around the supermarket almost on automatic pilot and they think right broccoli I know that's good, blueberries I know that's good. Try something new

JV: Yes, reinvent your shopping list, that's what I say.

FH: Absolutely. All the supermarkets have recipe leaflets now and you know many have magazines, and so

JV: It's all to do with healthy eating. Now Jessie wants to know "does it matter if she doesn't eat any fruit or veg for a few days and then does a catch up you know kind of over the weekend or something, or a couple of days later."

FH: It is a good question Jessie. I mean we all, even me as a nutritionist, we all have days when we don't eat as healthily as we know we should or we would like to and you know its not going to cause any major problems, but generally you want to try and get your five portions of fruit and veg in. We've talked about all the good stuff that it offers you but also it displaces the bad stuff from the diet as well, so if you're eating a banana for a snack you're less likely to find your hand in you know the biscuit tin or find yourself reaching for a chocolate bar. So if you're not having your five fruit and veg the chances are that you're filling up on the less healthy stuff.

JV: It's funny we don't binge eat do we on fruit and veg

FH: No

JV: Ok, well Crazy Nick wants to know, "why is it that our UK target is only five a day cos a friend of his in America recently told him that you have to eat nine portions of fruit and veg"

FH: Quite right, yeah

JV: So why is the UK and the US so different?

FH: Well we struggle to reach five a day really and

JV: Well only three quarters of us are actually

FH: On average people eat two to three portions a day so to suddenly decide it was going to be nine a day it seems like such a difficult target for people to reach. You know you never know when we've got everyone eating five a day we might just change the goal posts slightly and say "Oh, now it's seven a day." Basically the more you eat the healthier you're going to be, that's the message.

JV: And grow your own vegetables. That is an answer. You just go in the garden and pick them.

FH: Yeah that's ok but I live in London. I've got a window box. You can't grow much in a window box.

JV: Get some herbs in there I think. Now Rick Wood has just sent us a question saying "Why is it so important to ensure that we are getting in five a day? Surely so long as we don't eat too much and take a lot of exercise that's enough?" I mean that's quite a good question actually.

FH: It is. You know a healthy lifestyle is a bit like a jigsaw puzzle and healthy eating is just one little piece of that jigsaw puzzle, but it's quite a crucial part. Why is it important to eat five a day? Because we know that studies have shown that people who do eat five a day live longer and healthier lives. What nutritionists tend to do are these things called Epidemiological Studies. They look at population groups. So they looked at populations that lived in Northern Europe, UK and Scandinavia and compared them with groups of people that lived in Southern Europe; Italy and Crete, and they found out that people in Southern Europe lived longer and healthier lives. They were less likely to suffer from heart disease. They were less likely to get certain types of cancer, and one of the big differences between the diet that we eat in the UK and the diet that people eat in Southern Italy and Greece is the amount of fruit and vegetables. They eat twice as much as we do.

JV: Cos it kind of feels like your being dictated to when someone says you've got to eat five a day, and you know it's going to make you healthy, but in a way you know if we're not even reaching that target then we need to make more of an effort.

FH: I think the nice thing about the five a day message is that it does quantify things for people and nutrition is a complicated subject, and the easier we can make it you know the happier people will be. So it's just nice to know that you know you've got this target, five a day and you can tick them off. Ok, I've had a glass of fruit juice with my breakfast that's one; I've had a banana mid morning that's two; maybe a salad at lunchtime or a bowl of soup, because things like soup will count. Vegetable soup, that's three

JV: Preferably you've made yourself

FH: Yes that would be nice, but even you know shop bought varieties will count as well, and then some veg in the evening and maybe a fruit salad and that's your five

JV: Well keep your questions coming in. We have nutrition expert Fiona Hunter in the studio with us today. I have a question from Trish and she says "Why are potatoes not counted in five a day?"

FH: Oh Trish I'm asked this question so many times. It would be fantastic if they were wouldn't it? We could have chips and count it

JV: Exactly, yeah

FH: Potatoes fall into what we call the starchy carbohydrate group so they sit with bread and breakfast cereals, pasta and rice, and that's just because they contain more starch than other vegetables. They do contain some good stuff. They contain Vitamin C and they contain potassium's so we're not saying they're not as healthy as vegetables, but for these purposes they don't fall in the fruit and veg

JV: What about sweet potatoes?

FH: Sweet potatoes interestingly and other starchy vegetables, things like pumpkin for instance and parsnips, we consider them to be vegetables but not potatoes.

JV: You see that's quite interesting

FH: It is and the other thing that's interesting is in some parts of the world, I know in America and some of our viewers might tell us elsewhere, potatoes are considered to be vegetables, but not in the UK.

JV: No, never mind. Sorry about that Trish. Now Dangerous Dave wants to know, "he has to admit that he doesn't really like the taste of fruit and veg. Is there anything else that he can do to be sure that he is getting the benefits of five a day without having to sit and eat grapefruit all day?" I don't know what you've been told Dangerous Dave

FH: Well there's such a huge variety, so you know if you were listening to what we said earlier Dave, maybe you haven't tried some things like red peppers or courgettes or some of the more exotic fruits that are now available. So don't be shy, look for recipes that help you incorporate fruit and vegetables into meals, so vegetable curry for instance you know, or cauliflower cheese, something like that. If you really can't find any vegetables that you like concentrate more on the fruit. If you really can't find any fruit that you like, things like the fruit juice that we talked about

JV: I mean the fruit juice also, I was l going to say that my son, I used to make him smoothies in the morning and I used to actually add fruit juice to fruit, like bananas and berries and things, and blitz it up and you know make it look exciting in a nice cup, and you know and he would think it was great you know. So make it interesting I think is the key isn't it?

FH: Yes. Of course in the summer months we've got all those lovely berries around and they're cheap and you know they're sweet, and it's so easy just to get a blender, put in the berries, put in some fruit juice and whiz it all up. Maybe a yoghurt or some milk if you want a dairy based smoothie. This time of the year when it's not quite as easy to get berries you can use canned fruit, so things like canned apricots, canned peaches. All the frozen fruits, you may have seen the bags of frozen summer berries that you can get in some of the supermarkets. You can just blitz those in the blender.

JV: Well actually it's interesting enough because Kaza wants to know "Do you think it would be better to use a smoothie maker or a juicer when getting kids to eat more fruit and veg?" And the difference is the smoothie maker you're obviously just mixing all the vegetables together and the juicer you're actually extracting the juice from carrots or celery

FH: Yeah that's a really good question. I think with the smoothie maker you're getting the benefit of getting the whole fruit, so you're getting the fibre. When you juice fruits some of the fibre is removed, but there are only certain fruits that you can use to make smoothies. So for instance you can't tend to use apples because the Smoothie maker motor isn't powerful enough. You really need to juice apples, so you can tend to use the soft fruits for making smoothies, things like berries and bananas and canned fruits make great smoothies. The benefit of juicers is you can juice all sorts of things. You can juice carrots. Carrot and apple is one of my favourites with a little bit of ginger.

JV: And carrot's great because you know it tastes so different, and it's so frothy and it's really creamy when you juice carrot.

FH: Yes and it's very sweet. Kids tend to love it, so particularly for mums that might struggle to get kids to eat fruit and vegetables probably a juicer is better. You can buy vegetable juicers now as well.

JV: And you can make it fun as well. You can get the kids to actually put the fruit into the juicer and make it part of a routine.

FH: Just before we move on, the advantage of smoothies is that they tend to be dairy based and we know a lot of kids in this country are sometimes short on calcium, so that blend of fruit with dairy, milk or yoghurt is a good, healthy combination for kids.

JV: Now some questions from busy mums on the run. A question come through saying his partner and her work full time and they don't always have the time to go shopping for healthy alternatives and then cook them, have you any suggestions for having our five vegetables a day with their busy work schedule, because you know some people just think convenience food because it's so convenient, you bung it in the microwave and then you take it out and you sit in front of the TV. So you know do you have any suggestions to make it easier?

FH: Yeah well a little bit of forward planning at the weekends will always help

JV: Forward planning?

FH: Forward planning yes,

JV: For a busy mother?

FH: So a bit of a menu plan at the weekend and if you can do a big shop either go or do it on the internet. I know so many people are shopping on the internet these days so that you know you've got your cupboards, your freezer, well stocked. We've talked a little bit about frozen produce already; it's just as nutritious as fresh, very quick, very convenient, so if you come back and you know you haven't had time to go and get any fresh fruit or vegetables you can just take out a handful of frozen peas and bung it into the spaghetti bolognaise. Frozen peas are ideal for making soups with. Pea soup is delicious.

JV: Great Vitamin C as well isn't it?

FH: Yes, in fact there was a piece of research done several years ago now where they looked at the vitamin content of fresh peas and frozen peas, and interestingly they found that the frozen peas, because they were picked and processed literally within you know hours of being picked, they had a higher content of Vitamin C than the fresh peas.

JV: Now you see that's interesting cos we always tend to steer clear from frozen foods thinking that all the goodness has been kind of taken out of it but it hasn't really has it? It's just been kept in.

FH: The freezing actually locks in the goodness, and it's just not vegetables. You can get some really nice, frozen fruits now, frozen berries which are great this time of year, as I say when it isn't quite as easy to get the fresh.

JV: We have nutrition expert Fiona Hunter in the studio with us so please keep all your questions coming in here live on this web chat. Now Kaz has sent us a question saying "Hi Fiona, how can I fit in five fruit and veg into her lifestyle cos I'm a full time Mum?"

FH: Yes I know, it's hard isn't it Kaz. Well we talked about breakfast earlier. Make sure you get at least two portions at breakfast cos then that gets you off to a good start. So a glass of fruit juice will count as one of your five servings and then maybe a banana chopped up on your breakfast cereal, and what I like is peanut butter on toast with mashed banana on top. So automatically you've ticked off two from your five a day, and then at lunchtime perhaps something like a vegetable soup or a salad in the summer months, or you know if you buy your lunch on the way to work a lot of the supermarkets and sandwich shops now will do these packs of ready made fruit salad, that will count, or a pack of dried fruit. The advice we gave to someone earlier was to keep some in your, you know back pack or your handbag or your desk at work.

JV: Just carry a banana with you or an apple or something, so if you do get peckish then

FH: Yeah, another good tip is to, if you do work in an office or even when you're at home, keep the fruit bowl full and on display so you know you see it and you think "Oh right I haven't had any fruit today I'll have an apple or I'll have a plum."

JV: Remember don't put sweets in that fruit bowl.

FH: Hide the biscuit tin

JV: And hide the biscuit tin. Minnie has sent you a question and she says that she has a five and six year old, and she worries that they're not getting enough, well they're not getting five a day. How much is a portion for them? Is it the same size as an adult?

FH: Well I wouldn't get too worried about portions Minnie. Think of a fist and a child's fist

JV: Their size fist

FH: Their size fist is a portion for a child. It's much more important than worrying too much about portions that we make sure we give them a variety of different fruit and vegetables and each meal they have, they have some fruit or some vegetables; so maybe just a few little pieces of orange with their lunch and some slices of apple. A spoon of peas and some carrots with their evening meal, and it gets them into the idea of seeing vegetables on the plate. Don't get too stressed if they won't eat them. I know all kids go through food fads. I don't know if yours have got to that stage yet?

JV: Well I think just to make it exciting. I mean with my son we do things called apple stick lollies, where you know we get kind of sticks and we chop up apples and put them on them, and we get really excited that he's eating a lolly pop but it's an apple you know, and so

FH: Sneaky

JV: So just make it kind of fun I think really isn't it.

FH: Actually thinking about fun ideas we've got loads of ideas on the Minute Maid Website

JV: Oh well, there you go

FH: And the address is www.minutemaid.co.uk

JV: Does it have recipe ideas?

FH: It has some recipe ideas, some tips. One thing that's just come to mind is making jellies. All kids love jelly and you can make jelly with fruit juice or something like this. Either set it with jelly crystals or set it with some gelatine or veggie gel if you're vegetarian

JV: Or just, I should be writing some recipes for the website as well; or you could actually pour fruit juice into lolly kind of holders and then freeze them

FH: It's great in the summer months

JV: Yeah that too, that's a great idea. Emma in Essex has sent in a question, and she says that she often skips breakfast in the morning and because of the pressure at work means that she has little time for lunch, I mean we all know that. So other than a quick desk snack are there fruit and vegetables that need the least preparation?

FH: Well a banana is a good example really. How long does it take to peel a banana or an apple? An apple takes a little bit longer to eat and is a little bit more, so if time is really short, but dried fruits as well. Keep some dried fruits on your desk. Now they're quite a concentrated source of sugar because once you've taken the water out, so you don't need quite as many; just three dried apricots is equivalent to one portion.

JV: Oh ok.

FH: Or keep something like some grapes here or a bowl of cherry tomatoes on your desk. So if you're feeling like nibbling you can just pop them in.

JV: Ok, well there are some specific medical questions now. Ron wants to know, he's a type 2 diabetic but he's finding it very difficult to obtain recipes that are aimed at those with this problem. Can you help? Now that's quite difficult isn't it because you have to restrict your sugar intake?

FH: Yes, but I mean it doesn't mean you can't eat fruit or take fruit juice. You just shouldn't have too much at the same meal. Diabetes UK have a very good website, they have a magazine as well and lots of information and recipe books so that would be one place to look, but you can enjoy all of these fruit and vegetables that we see here. There is nothing that is restricted if you're a diabetic. The only advice that I would give is you know don't eat a huge, great bunch full of grapes, you know restrict yourself to five portions and spread it throughout the day.

JV: Yeah I think that's the key. If you spread it then you're not kind of overloading the system with too much sugar as well. Now Kelli has sent you a question and this is quite specific. She has got gestational diabetes and she's in her third trimester, and she's been told to cut out fruit juice and not to eat too much fruit that could turn into sugar so she's kind of at a loss really over what she can and what she can't eat. Now she doesn't want to deprive her baby of any important nutrients cos it's quite an important time for her.

FH: Obviously you know

JV: I really feel for you actually Kelli because I had exactly the same problem and I did have to cut out you know a lot of cakes and chocolates and crisps, potatoes, so what does she do to actually kind of give her child the nutrients it needs even though she has diabetes?

FH: Well cutting out the cakes, and the chocolates and the crisps and those naughty foods, you're not really going to miss out on too much. It is important that you still include some fruit and vegetables into your diet and even fruit juice. You know have a small glass of fruit juice at breakfast time, that's fine. What you've probably been told not to do is to have too much fruit juice all in one go or eat too much fruit all in one go, and fruit does have sugar in it. It has a good type of sugar called fructose, but it is turned into sugar in the blood stream.

JV: But its slow release as well

FH: Its slow release but you still shouldn't eat too much at one sitting, but a small glass of fruit juice would be fine; an apple or an orange you know. Certainly vegetables don't have as much sugar in them so concentrate

JV: Bananas is a good one as well

FH: Yeah, concentrate on the vegetable side and good luck with the pregnancy.

JV: Yes good luck, fingers crossed and just remember that it will all work out better in the end, and also after the pregnancy you just go back to your pre-pregnancy weight cos you haven't eaten all the rubbish food that you're not supposed to eat. So Ida in Leeds has sent a question saying "are there any pills available that she could take as a replacement that provide the same benefits of five a day?" All these people that want to cheat. I don't know.

FH: Ida, Ida, Ida, it's normally the men that are looking for the easy excuse. Ida's let us down here. Seriously there are lots of pills and potions and all sorts of things that claim to be able to you know, take the place of fruit and vegetables but they really don't work. I mean its much better that you eat fruit and vegetables and the reason being is that we know what makes fruit and vegetables healthy is the fact that they contain vitamins, and they contain minerals, and they contain fibre, but they also contain these thing called phytochemicals, like beta-carotene, things like flavanoids, and we haven't quite got round to identifying all of those phytochemical compounds yet so it's impossible to put them in a pill. So you are missing out if you, you know take a pill and think you've got everything that you would get in a fruit salad or you know

JV: And probably you're spending more money as well because you know notoriously supplements are more expensive than buying you know fruit and veg and go down to your local market as well. I think that's quite important because you know you forget that's it actually quite fun to go and choose vegetables you know and have things organic

FH: Well I live very close to the Portobello Road Market and it is fantastic and it gives you a really good idea of what's in season as well, because we're not very good in this country at thinking about seasonality, and one of the things people often say to me is "Oh fruit and vegetables are so expensive" but they're not if you buy what's in season, and in season at the moment we have pumpkins which are, you know its almost Halloween so there's lots of pumpkins around. Very nutritious, you can make them into soup you can roast them like you would roast potatoes

JV: Parsnips

FH: Parsnips, yes I have a lovely recipe for curried parsnip soup. But if you shop at markets you really do get an idea of what's in season and it's much cheaper.

JV: Yeah and give us the website address again that we can get some recipe ideas.

FH: The website is www.minutemaid.co.uk

JV: Now Lucy in Brighton needs to know that she's ashamed to admit that her lunchtime consists of popping in to her local burger joint for a take away meal in a box and she needs to know "do the vegetables that come in the burger actually have any nutritional value at all?" I think the answer to that is what do you get in a burger? What, a bit of tomato

FH: I think, not that I ever go into burger joints, a little bit of gherkin and, but to be fair you know, and I'm not going to mention any names here but many of these burger joints are making a big effort to make it easier for people to choose healthier food. So they will have fruit available, they will have fruit juice available. So you can go and have your lunch in a burger joint and still get you know two of your portions of fruit with just a, you know, as a fruit juice and a fruit salad.

JV: Well actually talking of fast food, Red in Birmingham he said that he noticed that a lot of fast food outlets are producing quick snack salads, and even kind of fruit based dessert kind of take aways. Are these actually good for you and will they contribute to five a day cos I know a lot of them have, especially for kids, for kids meals they have the carrots, a portion of carrots and you know and some grapes instead of ice cream

FH: Yes, I mean they will all count. I think when we buy processed food and we buy food from sandwich shops we just need to be a little bit careful and maybe think about how much salt and how much sugar has gone into that product, and sometimes products are not quite as healthy as they seem. But certainly these little bags of carrots or bags of dried fruit that you can buy, or the salads, the fruit salads; the mix of melon and pineapple, they're great healthy choices and they will contribute to your five a day.

JV: Yeah cos certain fast food restaurants are kind of jumping on the band wagon about five a day and kind of selling them in their stores and really kind of hyping them up as well which can only be a good thing. The fact that it's in a fast food restaurant is kind of a double edged sword really.

FH: There's nothing wrong with fast food occasionally. Healthy eating is all about balance and providing you get enough of the good stuff in, and really I'm talking about fruit and vegetables here, then you know that's the most important thing. It's fine to have burgers occasionally, you know obviously not the sort of thing we would like to see people eating every day but once a week, you know less frequently than that, it's fine.

JV: As a treat

FH: Yeah providing you get the good stuff in as well

JV: Yes exactly, well we have nutrition expert Fiona Hunter live in the studio with us today, so keep your questions coming in. Now talking about fast food I just wanted to know, when you go out how easy is it to actually have portions of fruit and veg you know when you're going out for a meal in the evening? I mean cos it is quite difficult to choose from the menu you know what do you suggest?

FH: Well the first thing and the thing I always say to people is don't be shy about asking you know for an extra portion of veg. My big criticism of many restaurants is that the vegetables come smothered in butter so ask what your vegetables are going to be served with. Ask for a side salad. Restaurants are very good at giving side salads now.

JV: Well Lindsey wants to know that she gets an organic veg box every week, and they have at least two vegetables every night with dinner. Apart from a drink of fruit juice though her son and husband don't eat any fruit and veg during the day. Now how does she get them from three to five a day or should she just be happy that they are actually eating as much as they are?

FH: That's the big leap getting from three to five. Again it's forward planning, thinking about any opportunity that you can have to incorporate fruit and vegetables into your meal. So each meal should have ideally some fruit and vegetables in there. So we've talked about breakfast, the fruit juice and maybe the banana or the dried fruit; some fruit as a snack, a banana on toast; something like a vegetable soup at lunchtime. Interestingly beans will count, so a bean salad will count.

JV: What about baked beans?

FH: Baked beans, yes. You need to be careful about the amount of salt and sugar in baked beans but beans, like fruit juice, however many you eat will only count as one of your servings.

JV: And also the fruit juice as well

FH: Fruit juice, yes and things like these fruit drinks and we know for children its really important we spoke about hydration earlier you know and I think we might just have spoken about adults, but it's very important for children because children are much more susceptible to dehydration than adults because they're running around far more.

JV: And Lindsey, I mean I didn't actually know until I was talking to you Fiona that a bottle of fruit juice is actually one portion of your required fruit and veg a day, so that's quite useful to know that information. Now Mike has sent a question in. He said "fruit and veg every day is expensive, or at least it is in his supermarket. He just can't afford to buy it every day." I think a lot of people have that mentality as well. He buys a lot of tinned fruit instead. Are these actually doing anything for him?

FH: Yes that's fine. Tinned products, canned, frozen products, dried fruits for instance, things like dried apricots and prunes or sun dried plums as we're supposed to call them now

JV: A sun dried?

FH: Plum, but again we spoke earlier about being a canny shopper, shopping at markets, buying what's in season

JV: And also I think if you go kind of late afternoon like 5 o'clock when the markets are closing down and you can often get, like you know they're selling off bananas for a pound for a whole bowl and the broccoli and so that's quite a good way. If you're finding it too expensive just to go at the end of the day when the markets are just closing and you know bag yourself a bargain, a bargain of fruit.

FH: One thing that people sometimes don't realise count is tomatoes, canned tomatoes will count. Canned tomatoes are incredibly cheap and the basis of lots of meals, so bulk out the more expensive part of your meals like the meat. If you're making a spaghetti bolognaise or a shepherds pie or a curry bulk it out with canned tomatoes, beans, frozen vegetables, for instance carrots. Carrots are very reasonable as well

JV: Make it yourself cos that's cheap as well to do that. Now April has sent you a question saying that "she's a vegetarian and she eats more than five pieces of fruit and veg a day. Will this cause her any problems or is it ok to do this?"

FH: No its fine,

JV: I mean praise her.

FH: Well done April. We did speak earlier about the fact that in America the message is nine a day. I would say the more you eat the healthier you're going to be. The only thing I would say to Rachel is she talked about eating five

JV: April yeah

FH: Five portions of fruit. You need to get some veggies in there as well April. I'm sure you are if you're a vegetarian, but the more you eat the healthier you'll be so well done.

JV: Does it matter about organic food as well? Does it matter that we're eating organic or just fruit and veg that we buy from the supermarket? There is often a myth around that.

FH: The message is the more we eat the healthier we'll be whatever type. Now I know sometimes people worry about pesticide residues in fruit and vegetables, and if that's the case they can buy organic but if you think about the risks, and I've spoken to experts about this, the benefits that we get from eating more fruit and vegetables far outweighs any risks from pesticide residues. We're sometimes not very good at putting risks into perspective here.

JV: Now we don't have much time but we do have time for one quick question from Dan Peters in Nottingham and he wants to know "do you yourself manage five a day? If so please tell me how you do it." Good question Dan.

FH: I do sometimes struggle. I find it much easier in the summer when we have lots of lovely fruit and vegetables around, but the one thing I do try and do is have these two portions at breakfast. So I will have my glass of fruit juice, tick that, and then I will have banana on toast or banana in my porridge

JV: See even a nutrition expert finds it hard to have five a day. Fiona Hunter thank you so much for coming in and doing the live web chat today, and give us the web address again so that we can get ideas for recipes, and what we should be eating

FH: Loads of tips and information on the website. The address is www.minutemaid.co.uk

JV: Thanks a lot for that

FH: Thank you

JV: I'm going to go and have a fruit juice and I think that will count one portion at least a day

FH: Yes, well done

JV: Thank you very much

FH: Bye bye

JV: Thanks for that

 

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